by Kris Tualla
“On whose authority?” another man asked.
This was the critical moment; her chance to take control.
“My own, of course.” Half the crowd nodded, but the other half shook their heads. Eryn pressed on, “Since the death almost a year past of Henry le Bell, may God sain his soul”—Eryn crossed herself as did the assemblage—“I have been running this estate on behalf of young William Robert. I intend to continue, until he comes of an age to do so himself.”
The head-shaking ceased, but the gazes were still suspicious.
“Explain yourself, then,” the first man demanded.
Eryn stepped closer to the huddled bodies. “I am well aware that many of our tenants have fled in hopes of better circumstances. But I ask you, what better circumstances are there to be had?” She spread her hands. “Your homes are here. Your families are here. You know this land well, do you not?”
Glances. Shrugs. Nods.
“Here is what I propose: the estate will be divided between those who wish to earn ownership of their own land, and those who wish to remain as serfs for William. For those men and women remaining as serfs, nothing will change; you will continue to work for, and be cared for by, the Bell estate.”
“And the others?” a man in the back prodded.
“The others will work their own plots. Each year one tenth of what they produce must be given to the estate. In ten years, the land will be wholly theirs.” Eryn chose one big man to lock eyes on.
“Why start with nothing?” she queried. She tossed her hood back, exposing her head to the icy elements. Snow melted in her hair and seeped to her scalp. “Why wander in hopes of finding empty, unworked fields? Tumbling plague houses? Broken fences? I am offering you fertile land, already tilled. Houses already built.”
Another rumble rose, but this time the heads bobbed in affirmation.
“What abou’ the livestock?” the big man asked.
“I’ll sell them to you for a return of one animal per animal taken. You’ll have three years to breed them and repay me. Repay William, that is.” Eryn grinned to cover her slip. “All the rest are yours to keep.”
A lanky redheaded young man pushed his way forward and pointed an accusing finger at Eryn. “What’s in this for ye?” he demanded.
What indeed.
Not nearly enough.
“I will have a roof over my head, food on my table, and a little to set aside for the day when William takes his rightful place as lord of the Bell estate.” She turned and stepped toward the manor, then faced the crowd again. “In the meantime, you shall address me as Lady Eryndal Bell and afford me all the rights and respect due the lady of an estate—because that is what I am. Have you any objections?”
For a moment, no one spoke. No one moved. All the men seemed to be weighing the options before them, as well as her overt claim to the title. Eryn’s hands fisted alongside her thighs. Her jaw clenched.
She earned this role, damn it.
She was head of the household staff when Lady Elspeth le Bell fell victim to the plague. For several months afterward, Eryn fulfilled every one of that worthy woman’s roles, including the raising of William. When Henry le Bell’s steward died, she assumed his authority over the rapidly diminishing staff as well. By the time Henry himself succumbed, there was nothing on the estate that she wasn’t managing on her own. That was January seventh, the day after the feast of Epiphany, this same year.
She already proved herself capable. She only lacked the official designation. Now was the time to claim it.
The big man she had addressed directly straightened and dipped his chin. “No, my lady. I have no objections at all.” He glared down at the younger redhead and nudged him with an elbow.
“Uh, no. Lady Bell,” he squeaked.
She swept the crowd with an intense gaze, searching for reluctance or outright rebellion. There was none. “Good. Those of you wishing to earn your lands come back tomorrow at noon. Together we shall draw your boundaries on the map. If you do not appear, you will not be given the option again. Is that fair?”
Nods all around. Some smiles. Backs were being slapped. Hands were clasped and shaken. Eryn turned to her steward, Jamie.
“See that everyone gets another cup, will you? It’s a cold day and the walk home will be thus eased.”
He dipped his chin in grinning respect. “Of course, Lady Bell. As you wish.”
***
Eryn’s hands shook as she closed the door to the manor. She leaned her backside against it and blew a long sigh. A rivulet of cold sweat trickled down her backbone as melted snow dripped from her hair.
Her offer was accepted; her role wasn’t challenged. The bastard orphan of Elstow Abbey, Bedford, England was now Lady Eryndal Smythe Bell of Castleton, Scotland. Foster mother of William Robert Bell, heir.
And still well-liked, so it seemed. Eryn crossed herself again and kissed the crucifix that hung from her belt. Its amber beads smiled dully in the candlelight, approving her success.
Thank you, Father. Be with me always.
Eryn straightened and made her way to the kitchen at the back of the huge manor. William was there, red-eyed and sniffling over a plate of toasted bread and honey. Geoffrey sat astride the bench beside the lad. He held a steaming goblet of his own.
“You’re still alive I see,” Geoff teased, though his eyes were unsmiling. “The peasants have accepted your elevated status, then?”
“They have. Tomorrow we shall see how many of them wish to earn their freedom.” Eryn took the goblet from Geoffrey’s hand and swallowed a large gulp of the warmed mead. She began to smooth Liam’s russet hair but he jerked his head from her reach.
“Don’t,” he growled.
Eryn handed Geoff his goblet and sat beside Liam. “I know you’re angry that your parents died, Liam. I have no intention of taking their place.”
“Then leave.”
“If I do, you’ll starve. Don’t you understand that?”
One shoulder moved a little and dropped back into place.
“Will you look at me Liam?” she whispered.
Brown eyes rimmed in red lifted to hers under a canopy of ginger. His lips were pressed in a hard line.
“Today I made arrangements that will keep the tenants here until you are grown. They will bring us food and animals and things that they make, so that we may always have a warm place to live and plenty of food. I’ll make your clothes as I always have. I’ll take care of you the way your mother wanted.”
Tears bulged on the boy’s lower lids but he swiped them away before they spilled. “You’re no’ my mither!” he snapped.
The litany was an old one and Eryn ignored it. “The thing is, Liam, every time you try to hurt me with your mischief, it’s your own estate you harm.”
“She’s right, ye ken,” Geoffrey added. He leaned closer. “And as Constable it’s my task to keep peace and punish the wrongdoers, isn’t it?”
William’s mouth twisted and his chin trembled. He stood, grabbed the last of his toast in a grubby fist, and ran out of the kitchen. Eryn might have worried if she couldn’t hear his boots thumping up the stairs. The slam of his chamber door assured her of his whereabouts.
Geoffrey took her hand. “He needs a man around, and ye ken it’s true.”
Eryn looked away. “Not now, Geoff, please. I’m done in after the meeting. Besides, I’ve got maps to study and—”
He rose to his feet of a sudden, stopping her words. He glanced over his shoulder at the women preparing the evening meal and then pulled Eryn to her feet. “Come.”
“Where?”
“The Hall.”
Eryn followed Geoff because he had firm hold of her hand. She didn’t want to pull it away and upset him. If her intuition was correct, their pending conversation was going to be difficult enough as it was.
Geoff led her to a corner of the huge hearth and bade her to sit. He knelt in front of her. “Marry me, Eryn.”
Her shoulders slumped.
“Please don’t ask me that, Geoff.”
He shook his head and the grip on her hand tightened. “I’ve waited, as ye asked.”
“I know.”
“The Death is past. No one has died since Lord Henry. It’s almost the year.”
“True, but—”
“And the boy needs a father. Ye see it plain as day!” he pressed.
“And why do you ask me today?” she countered.
His brow furrowed. “What do you mean?
“Today I am the Lady Bell. Yesterday I was only Eryndal Smythe. Why not yesterday?”
Geoff’s cheeks grew splotchy and darkened the gray of his eyes. “That’s no’ fair, and ye ken it well!”
She did. But his proposal made her feel like a rabbit in a trap. “It’s only that, well, it seems as if… oh, I don’t know.” She pulled her hand from Geoffrey’s.
“Do ye no’ have a care for me, Eryndal Smythe?” he pleaded.
She laid her fingertips against his cheek. “Of course I do. You’ve been my steady friend since I arrived here, a maid of only fifteen years.”
He laid his hand over hers and pressed her palm against his bearded jaw. “I hoped for more than friendship.”
“I know…” Her voice caught in her throat. How could she explain feelings she herself didn’t fully understand?
“Is my hope foolishness, then?” he asked.
“No, Geoff. But I asked for a year, remember? A year with no deaths?”
He nodded slowly. “Aye. But it’s been—”
“It’s been ten and a half months.”
His grip on her hand loosened. “Ye’ll be a stickler then? Hold out to the end?”
Eryn leaned forward and kissed him softly on the lips. “Ask me again in a month and a half. Until then, give me peace and time to organize the changes. Will you?”
Geoff slid a large hand behind her head and pulled her into his more demanding kiss. He tasted of the mead and his warm breath grazed her cheek. She didn’t resist; she didn’t want to. When the kiss ended, he leaned his forehead against hers. “Aye, I’ll do it. But don’t hold me off forever.”
“No,” she lied.
She looked out the window. The snowfall was blowing harder.
Hermitage Castle
Scottish Borderlands
December 1, 1354
Lord Andrew Drummond wrapped a scarf around his throat and tucked the scrap of wool into the collar of his cloak. It formed a slight barrier to the snow that was beginning to fall harder and at a distinctly unfriendly angle. Hermitage Castle rose on the horizon, a formidable square of wood standing forty feet tall. Drew couldn’t see any evidence of habitation; no activity around the structure, no smoke rising on this frigid afternoon.
“Shite. It appears deserted. This might very well be the longest and most miserable day of the past year,” he grumbled to his vassal. Melted snowflakes ran into his eyes and snot dripped from his nose. He couldn’t feel his toes.
Kennan steered his huge brown gelding closer to Drew’s gray stallion. “If no one’s there, we’ll ride on, aye?”
“Aye. There’s no reason to bide in that overgrown tomb otherwise.” He wiped his nose on the end of the scarf. “It’s five miles to Castleton. If we push, we can be there in an hour.”
“The horses are done in, I’m afraid,” Kennan said.
“Hour and a half, then.”
The castle was, indeed, uninhabited. Victim of both the endless border wars with England and the half decade of plague, no one—so it seemed—deemed this fortification important enough to winter here. They were on to Castleton, then.
Lord Andrew Drummond was done in as well. For a year and a half he and Kennan had traversed Scotland on behalf of King David II. Held in the Tower of London since 1346 as prisoner of England’s King Edward III, Drew was his Scottish king’s main connection with the country he reigned over. Frequent trips to London had been deferred until Drew could assess the condition of Scotland following the Black Death.
The news was grim at best, horrifying most often.
Bodies rotting in overfull graves. Villages devoid of any living being. Empty houses with fallen roofs. Animals, wandering and starving. Children’s cries echoing in the night.
More than half of the Scottish countryside lay dead. England as well. And it was worse in the cities, where people lived in each other’s pockets and disease scuttled without mercy.
After his visit to Castleton, it would fall to Lord Andrew Drummond to ride to London and explain all this to a king who witnessed none of it. To explain to his sovereign why Scotland was unable to raise a ransom to secure his freedom. Why the world he once knew was irrevocably altered. It was not a pleasant proposition. He shivered.
Drew truly was done in.
“There it is. And it’s got people,” Kennan said, rousing him from his lethargic contemplation.
Visible through the quickening snow, the sight of the lit manor, smoke leaning from her chimneys and bodies scurrying in her yard, sent waves of relieved exhaustion pulsing through Drew’s tense body. His cheeks were stiff with cold and the scarf only served to act as a wick, dripping melted snow inside his cloak. Perhaps the time to quit his vocation was upon him.
“Thank God,” he muttered. He pulled back on the reins as his warhorse strained forward, eager to reach shelter of his own. “Easy. We mustn’t charge in or they’ll mistake our intent.”
“Aye, sir.” Kennan guided his mount behind Drew. “I’ll follow ye.”
***
“Riders are approaching, my lady.”
Eryn looked up from her needle. “How many?”
“Only two,” Jamie said.
“Have they a banner?”
“No.”
She set aside the tunic she was making for William and followed her steward to the window. If there were just two of them, they were not likely to be reivers or thieves. But who would be out so late on such a violent day? The sun was buried behind thick gray clouds and her light was dying quickly.
Eryn leaned against the small window panes and tried to discern what sort of problem might be advancing toward her home. All she could make out were two enormous war horses. The riders carried no colors that she could see, but then the snowfall turned everything into dark splotches on shifting white.
“Are they English or Scots, do ye think?” Jamie asked.
“It doesn’t matter. If they come in peace, I’ll shelter them.” Eryn turned to her steward. They were the same height—five feet and nine inches—but his lean frame was deceptively strong. “Have the hands ride out to meet them. Watch for signs of aggression. If there are none, bring them inside and stable their horses. I’ll meet them in the Hall.”
“Yes, lady.”
“And if they are suspect, kill them.”
Jamie nodded and hurried to do her bidding.
Eryn looked back out the window. Ordering that men be put to death was not an act her conscience rested with, but at times it must be done even so. If she meant to hold her position, she had to give orders without fear. She had to do what was necessary to protect the estate, her serfs, and William.
Please, God, spare their lives, she prayed silently. Let them be friends, not foes.
THE HANSEN FAMILY TREE
Sveyn Hansen* (b. 1035 ~ Arendal, Norway)
***
Rydar Hansen (b. 1324 ~ Arendal, Norway)
Grier MacInnes (b. 1328 ~ Durness, Scotland)
Eryndal Bell Hansen (b. 1327 ~ Bedford, England)
Andrew Drummond (b. 1325 ~ Falkirk, Scotland)
***
Jakob Petter Hansen (b. 1485 ~ Arendal, Norway)
Avery Galaviz de Mendoza (b. 1483 ~ Madrid, Spain)
***
Brander Hansen (b. 1689 ~ Arendal, Norway)
Regin Kildahl (b. 1693 ~ Hamar, Norway)
***
Martin Hansen (b. 1721 ~ Arendal, Norway)
Dagne Sivertsen (b. 1725 ~ Ljan, Norway)
Reidar Hansen (b.
1750 ~ Boston, Massachusetts)
Kristen Sven (b. 1754 ~ Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
Nicolas Hansen (b. 1787 ~ Cheltenham, Missouri Territory)
Siobhan Sydney Bell (b. 1789 ~ Shelbyville, Kentucky)
Stefan Hansen (b. 1813 ~ Cheltenham, Missouri)
Kirsten Hansen (b. 1820 ~ Cheltenham, Missouri)
Leif Fredericksen Hansen (b. 1809 ~ Christiania, Norway)
***
Tor Hansen (b. 1913 ~ Arendal, Norway)
Kyle Solberg (b. 1919 ~ Viking, Minnesota)
Teigen Hansen (b. 1915 ~ Arendal, Norway)
Selby Hovland (b. 1914 ~ Trondheim, Norway)
***
*Hollis McKenna Hansen (b. 1985 Sparta, Wisconsin)
Kris Tualla is a dynamic, award-winning, and internationally published author of historical romance and suspense. She started in 2006 with nothing but a nugget of a character in mind, and has created a dynasty with The Hansen Series, and its spin-off, The Discreet Gentleman Series. Find out more at: www.KrisTualla.com
Kris is an active PAN member of Romance Writers of America, the Historical Novel Society, and Sisters in Crime, and was invited to be a guest instructor at the Piper Writing Center at Arizona State University.
“In the Historical Romance genre, there have been countless kilted warrior stories told. I say it's time for a new breed of heroes. Come along with me and find out why: Norway IS the new Scotland!”